


Too Much

by ArabellaStrange



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Compliant, Coda, David thinks of everything in terms of movies, Episode: s06e08 The Presidential Suite, Established Relationship, Fights, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, Love, M/M, Sibling Love, Spoilers for 6x08 "The Presidential Suite", Wedding Planning, if you love something...
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-03
Updated: 2020-03-03
Packaged: 2021-02-28 04:02:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22997392
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArabellaStrange/pseuds/ArabellaStrange
Summary: David tries to deal with Patrick's (over-tanned) irritation, which turns out to be more than that for both of them. Meanwhile, no one has seen Alexis all day. Or, when Alexis cries, we all cry.Set immediately post-6x08/"The Presidential Suite." Canon-compliant and spoilers through that gut-punch of an episode.
Relationships: Alexis Rose & David Rose, Patrick Brewer/David Rose, Theodore "Ted" Mullens/Alexis Rose
Comments: 48
Kudos: 292





	Too Much

**Author's Note:**

> Last call for spoilers for 6x08.
> 
> Title borrowed from the lovely Rachel Vorona Cote's new book. Light #CW for mentions of David's various insecurities (though none of them present as problems here).
> 
> (Also, all errors mine: not beta'd, so if you see any typos or formatting problems, please LMK!)

  


The words ricocheted in his head later, after Stevie had gone home, after a joking but tense dinner, after their nightly routines and a quick kiss goodnight. 

  


" _Can we just agree to stop making this wedding a bigger deal than it needs to be?_ ” Patrick had asked, exasperated—over-tanned and annoyed. “ _We are not these people_." 

  


_These people_. 

  


Obviously Patrick wasn’t _those people_. Growing up in the rural equivalent of the Cheers bar, Patrick wasn’t exactly renowned for making a big deal of himself or his achievements. When everyone was in everyone else’s business, your big news tended to be public knowledge before it even happened, which (David had learned) really deflated the energy of a surprise. Well, it could, which was why it was so important to manage your own big news, so that it got celebrated appropriately. 

  


“ _We are not these people_ ,” Patrick had insisted, and it wasn’t like David didn’t get what he meant. They weren’t Kim and Kanye, Harry and Meghan, Scar Jo and the pasty guy from SNL. Their engagement photos weren’t going to be on Page Six, and their wedding wasn’t going to feature as a spread in _Vogue_ Parties. 

  


Patrick had been unexpectedly into the photoshoot idea when David raised it. 

  


“Oh…?” David had prepared a whole spiel about why it was important to document their relationship under favourable lighting conditions and with slightly higher-resolution images. Though, of course, given that Ray was probably going to be their photographer, exactly how high-res was somewhat suspect. 

  


“Yeah, I think it’s a good idea.” Patrick had said, hands pausing with applying labels to the new sunscreen shipment. (David had wished Patrick could get some more sun for this project.) “We can include them with our save-the-date cards. Gives us a fighting chance at avoiding my aunts and uncles accosting every man west of Elmdale to try to figure out who my fiancé is.” 

  


David had preened a little, as he always did when the f-word was dropped. “See, this is how we know your family are WASPs. My _very_ distant aunts and uncles, who I haven’t heard from in years, would love the opportunity to accost every eligible person west of Elmdale to try to find a nice doctor or hedge fund manager or—” He’d tried to think back. “—one time, someone from O.J.’s legal team to set me up with.” That had been a non-starter of a blind date. “Although,” he’d added, “in retrospect that would have meant I would now be related to the Kardashians, so…”

  


Smirking, Patrick had given him a look. “I don’t know if you know this about me,” he’d dropped his voice to a low murmur, and David had happily crowded in to bring their faces conspiratorially close. “But I’m actually a gainfully employed CPA. For an exclusive, high-end, consignment-model retail store.” 

  


“Mmm. Sounds expensive.” 

  


“I can get the quarterly reports, if you want to see just how expensive.” 

  


“I’ll alert the rabbi,” he’d replied, and Patrick had grinned some more as he went in for a kiss, which had become two, which became a long stretch of kisses until the bell over the door finally broke them apart. 

  


Now they had a stack of photos that Patrick and Stevie had both deemed unusable. Nor had anyone seemed interested in his headshot idea. There were, in fact, plenty of old, strictly curated photos of David from his old life, from pageants, headshots for small roles he’d taken thanks to Moira’s influence, gallerist profiles for magazines, even the sketch they’d sat for as the study ahead of that colossal family portrait. 

  


_I was ‘those people_ ,’ David’s brain muttered. Every event of his past life had been an exercise in making everything as big a deal as possible, always bigger than it “needed” to be. How else did you keep yourself entertained? How else did people know it was worth showing up, that you were someone they should be seen showing up for? You had to show off or risk being a has-been. 

  


Except of course, David was now very literally a has-been: once a bratty, selfish, seldom-sober millionaire fuckboy who was only good as far as you could throw him… or as long as his VIP invites extended. And David, to his credit (even in his own mind), could admit that he’d perfected that persona. He wasn’t Moira Rose’s firstborn for nothing. And he genuinely loved a spectacle, a performance. He was over-the-top more often than not, and unapologetically so. Even here—even in Schitt’s Creek, where the bar he had to clear was pathetically low, he refused to tone it down just to be accepted. It had been one of the biggest strokes of luck of his life that no one had asked him to. Sometimes he wondered if they were tired of it. 

  


Now Patrick was in bed, asleep, facing his nightstand. In movies and reality shows, everyone always recycled the advice about not going to bed angry. What nobody was clear about was whether it was bad to go to bed upset. It wasn’t like Patrick had asked him not to sleep here tonight, or had refused to touch him after Stevie left. Patrick’s hand had grazed David’s hip as he moved around him in the washroom, as usual. He’d given David that little kiss before turning out the light. But he hadn’t fully met David’s eyes in the last few hours. Nor had he said much as they got undressed, brushed their teeth, got under the covers. Instead, he’d sat for a moment on his side of the bed once David was in, facing out, his back and shoulders all David could see—strong and stiff and bowed slightly away from him. He’d sat there, still, long enough that David had been about to ask what was up, or (with panic rising in his mouth) to make a snippy remark and start a real fight about why Patrick was just sitting there sighing if he had a problem with something, but then Patrick had been scooting back, slipping his feet under the blankets, and—one automatic peck, one light “Night, David,” and then the light was out, and the moment to say something felt gone. 

  


Lying in the darkness, David kept hearing that phrase slapping the walls of his brain. Maybe Patrick wasn’t _those people_ , but… what if, deep down, David still was? 

  


*

  


On an average day, customers stopped in to browse without buying anything about five times, versus those who did buy something (about the same number, though more on a good day). Whether they did or didn’t leave with something wrapped in tasteful yet understated brown paper and/or cradled in a similarly natural-looking, modest tote, all embossed with the RA logo in shiny white or black ink, they almost _always_ complimented something in the store. “It’s so nice in here!” the middle-aged ladies gushed when they brought up their night cream or bath bombs or ceramic jewelry to the register. “I’m so glad I found something,” was the usual refrain from harried-looking male-presenting folk of most ages, usually holding a scarf, a plant pot, or a set of notebooks and pens which they virtually always took gift-wrapped. And, yes, okay, of course sometimes the compliments were about him. “Cool sweater, man,” evaluated one of the hoodlums who’d robbed their skincare section, and as hollow as that flattery had turned out to be, it was not the first time—by a long way—that someone had noticed David as the beautiful thing worth remarking upon within the store. 

  


“Ooh, aren’t you looking beach-ready today, Patrick!” exclaimed Jocelyn. “Got some sun?” 

  


David winced. 

  


Patrick’s entire body was frozen, awkward with displeasure, his smile sour and wrong as it tried barely at all to look like he appreciated Jocelyn’s _very_ unfortunately timed praise. “Thanks.” 

  


“I wish Roland and I had time to get to the spa,” she went on, blathering, ignoring David’s meaningful look that was clearly begging her to shut the fuck up already. “I haven’t looked tan like that since my sister’s husband fell off a jet ski in Vancouver and we had to spend a week down there waiting for him to get out of the hospital.” She gave an over-the-top wink to David, who fake-laughed at this horrific story because sure, who wouldn’t use an excuse to spend a week in Vancouver, but it wasn’t exactly the Pacific North-West’s answer to Ibiza. 

  


“Nope, just… a bit of a change-up,” grunted Patrick. His arms were moving even more clunkily than usual as he packed little dividers between the glass jars in Jocelyn’s RA cloth bag. 

  


“Well you look great! Bet you’re thrilled, huh, David? If Rollie came home looking like that we might have to put the baby in the bouncy chair by the TV for a few hours!” 

  


“Wow,” David smiled, as brightly as possible, wondering what it would take to cleanse his mind and the store of that atrocity of a comment. “Thanks so much for coming in, Jocelyn!” 

  


She waved herself out, holding the door for a series of people including at least one who David _suspected_ was in one of the other local baseball casts. The man looked over to give them a polite hello before his eyes landed on Patrick. “Whoa, Pat! Spring break already?” 

  


“Okay,” Patrick said, shoving the till drawer shut with a _ching!_ “You know what? I’m going to get a tea.” 

  


“Another one?” David asked. “You didn’t really eat your lunch. That much caffeine isn’t —” 

  


“Then I’ll go do inventory,” he shrugged, eyes daring David to ask about that, too. 

  


“Oh, okay, well —”

  


“You just… handle this,” he said, giving a dark glance at the customers coming up to the counter, including unfortunate sports rival man (who, it didn’t escape David’s notice, was kind of Patrick’s type, a little bigger than him and a little bit cocky and undeniably hot). 

  


Patrick disappeared behind the curtain before David could offer any comforting words—before he could think of any. 

  


Surely it was nice to be complimented? David sometimes felt bad, guilty for hogging all the customers’ attention. (Okay, no he didn’t, but he was very generous: he, unlike his mother, could genuinely share the spotlight with the right co-star!) And here they were, on a day when everyone finally paid due attention to Patrick’s very attention-worthy body in his cutest, tightest jeans and a light grey shirt that he’d probably thought muted his outrageous tan, but in fact just enhanced it. It should be like the whole spectacle with Ken, but this time spread out across a whole day, through little flakes of comments that added up to the same radiant look of smug self-satisfaction that Patrick had worn, tucking a cute boy’s phone number into his back pocket. (Admittedly, minus the things that came after that.) 

  


Instead, Patrick remained resolutely in the back during what turned out to be a rush, the sneaky, exhausting kind that involved a revolving door of customers who wanted to buy things and who even let themselves get up-sold, but never enough that David could break through and justify dipping into the back to demand Patrick’s help. 

  


By closing time, they’d nicely overshot their daily intake target, which meant having the day off tomorrow would also be extra sweet as he reveled in the store’s success. It also meant, sadly, that, of fucking course, half the customers had paid in weird cash and _change_ , so counting out the drawer would be an especially draining, mind-numbing task where David would probably lose track of the small bills and have to start over. 

  


Anyway, it was usually Patrick’s thing—his zen at the end of the day, right before sweeping, in the same way that a quick re-stock and setting to rights of the floor would help David unclench. 

  


“Patrick?” He braved himself to meet more steely gazes and terse teasing. Evidently, Patrick had, at least, really done the full re-stock, since the back room was now no longer a maze of half-opened merchandise. Everything was piled in tidy groups on the floor, or else put away in the correct baskets or shelves where they were supposed to go to await David’s clearance to move out front. He seldom had the energy to get things _this_ tidy. “Wow, well… weren’t you the busy little bee.” 

  


“Yeah, well, I figured I might as well do something back here since I couldn’t show my face out there.” 

  


David rolled his eyes, smiling, because okay, it was annoying, but it was also kind of cute when Patrick got into a little snit. Usually it was David who threw hissy fits and, if he was honest with himself, it was always kind of hilarious and soothing to know that sweet, good, mature Patrick was sometimes a diva. 

  


“I think ‘couldn’t show your face’ is a _little_ strong?” 

  


“David. A lady asked me _where I was from_.” 

  


“Yeah, wow, and that lady was more than slightly racist? So maybe we should be glad that we identified her before she comes back and tries to, like, convert us to the Conservative party?” 

  


“It’s not—” Patrick started to say, and his down-turned brows and crossed arms made it clear that _funny, David_ were the next words coming, when the bell over the front door pealed. 

  


David froze. 

  


“Did you lock up? Or flip the sign?” Patrick asked, flat. 

  


His pinched hands and all-clenched teeth gave Patrick all the answer he needed. 

  


“Ugh,” Patrick muttered, edging around David, and wow, he really was on a roll with this particular diva act. “Sorry, we’re actually closed…”

  


David left him to it, and went to pick up his phone from the desk where it was charging. 

  


**Stevie:** Have u seen Alexis? 

  


David blinked at the message. She’d texted about an hour ago. 

  


**David:** um no why

 **David:** I slept at P’s and she was with Ted last night

  


Three dots appeared right away, so he waited. 

  


**Stevie:** Ok well

 **Stevie:** Nobody’s seen her today

  


David wasn’t sure what that meant. Stevie wasn’t exactly a helicopter mom kind of person—she had once described her maternal or otherwise parental instincts as “a fatal allergy to any and all forms of care-taking that could involve having to wipe someone’s nose or give a shit about their day.” Fundamentally untrue, yes, but broadly speaking, she was an only child and (like him) a hermit by nature. 

  


**Stevie:** And then Twyla asked me too

 **Stevie:** Did she say anything to u

  


David tried not to roll his eyes. For a second, he’d been worried—worried because Stevie wouldn’t mention it unless she thought there was a reason to. But, okay, it wasn’t like _Twyla_ was exactly the best source for accurate information, was she? (Out front, the sound of low retail banter suggested that Patrick hadn’t been able to get the customer to leave.) 

  


**David:** who? Twlya? 

**David:** Patrick got lunch today (which is a whole thing, he’s being very bitchy about the tan still) 

  


**Stevie:** lol I bet

 **Stevie:** But she

 **Stevie:** She sorta acted like maybe I should check in with A, like something weird was going on

  


**David:** well yes, Twyla is weird

 **David:** what did she literally say? 

  


The sound of the register drawer pinged. As always, Patrick was a terrible disciplinarian, but at least he’d made a sale. Soon after, the front door bell dinged and, after that, the _clunk_ of the lock and the bouncing of the no doubt “Closed” sign against the glass. Then—he kind of braced for Patrick to come back here and rant at him about proper closing procedures, but… nope. Interesting. 

  


**Stevie:** She asked if Alexis was OK after last night? 

  


Again David rolled his eyes. 

  


**David:** I mean like ok probably not? Her hot boyfriend was only in town for like 24h and now he has to go back to some gorgeous island with gross bugs and science geeks and she can’t go even though we know she was like “DYINGGGG” for a vaca

 **David:** i’d be a little off too

  


**Stevie:** I guess

  


He put his phone down, satisfied he’d made his point. Plus he didn’t want to push it so long that Patrick actually came back here and nagged him about being on his phone when they were supposed to be cleaning and leaving. He left his phone on the desk as a sign of his mature ability to do the cleaning without having to check his texts and Insta (despite what _some_ pleasantly tan people might think). To show his commitment, he even remembered to grab the broom. 

  


*

  


They chatted about nothing through dinner, David managing to draw out longer and longer responses as the meal went on. He kept wedding things to a minimum, glad that this was not the week they also had to decide about flower-sourcing and the perennially tabled question of whether they were actually, truly, in real life going to go with _Ray_ as their wedding photographer. David needed another month at least of prowling every budget photographer within six hours’ drive—he would beg Stevie’s or Jake’s or Roland’s help, if that’s what it took (and as long as the favors needed weren’t too dire). 

  


“I’ll get that,” he offered, when Patrick piled David’s cutlery with his own onto the top dish of now-eaten stew juice (ew). “You cooked.” It had been delicious, despite the fact that it involved solely real ingredients pre-approved from the wedding diet list. 

  


Raising his eyebrows in mock shock, Patrick let him take the plates (ew, ew) without protest. “Be my guest.” 

  


“Who’s Beauty and who’s the beast, though?” David trilled. 

  


“Funny,” Patrick dead-panned, but he swatted David’s hip as he went to turn on some prime time contest or gala or something, so it didn’t seem too bad. 

  


He could do this. He was a good spouse-to-be, when he put his mind to it. No one, literally no one, expected David to be a meek and muted bride, least of all David, but he was determined after this rather unpleasant experience to keep Patrick as much out of the line of fire as possible. Little did those hacks on the wedding Reddit threads know, they were about to get a lot more David Rose commentary. 

  


A little while later, he curled up next to Patrick with his book. It was nice, after very kindly donning the disgusting yellow sink gloves and apron, _and_ succeeding at not getting splashes of stain-causing dirty water anywhere on his outfit, to dive back into _Frankissstein_ while Patrick enjoyed his programme. They were fine. 

  


Reading about classic mad science weirdos and modern trans bots with Daddy kinks was, he discovered, a very successful way to tune out the squeaks of sports shoes on waxed tile. 

  


“ _I thought to call out but I confess I was afraid. And then the vision was gone_.” 

  


“Hi, Mom,” Patrick said, to his right, and David blinked, bleary, back to the present where Patrick was muting the television, standing, with his phone to his ear. 

  


That was nice, too, normal; kind of funny, somehow, that he had forgotten about other people, blocked out the sounds of the crowd on the screen, Patrick’s irrepressible commentary as his favourite players did something either very good or very stupid, and David felt miles away, up the rampart of a villa, naked, chilled and stirred by the rain in Geneva. He doubted Patrick had ever been to Geneva—to most of Europe. He knew he’d been to Paris with a school trip when he was sixteen, the trip where he and Rachel had made a promise not to lose their virginities to each other until they were eighteen (a sweet and sad stalling tactic). Among the other things he and David hadn’t discussed was the honeymoon. There was a whole section in the wedding binder about it, but he had put that on hold, too, while the timing for the actual wedding had jumped around so much. Plus, it wasn’t like they could actually afford any of the brochures he’d sent away for, with private cabins floating over aquamarine waves in the Maldives or in a rust-coloured _atelier_ across a cobblestone street from the Prado. It was less frequent, vanishing almost to non-existent, his wish that he could have at least some fraction of his old sickening wealth back. But sometimes... when he pictured what it would be like to make love to Patrick in an infinity pool on the edge of a Japanese mountain, to wine and dine him all over Tuscany but without the hideous floppy hat that they’d forced onto Diane Lane, he did miss it. 

  


“ _All my life I have feared such a state, and so it has seemed better to me to live how I can live, and not fear death. So I left with him at seventeen and these two years have been life to me_.” 

  


“Nope, uh… Actually we’re probably not sending those for another week.” 

  


The tone of that last sentence cut through the Gothic brooding. He looked up. Sure enough, Patrick was facing away from him, one hand on his hip as he listened to his mother. _Uh-oh._

  


“No, I know, but you can just… I know, mom, we’re going to send them soon. We just—there was a problem with the printing, and so it’s taking longer than I thought.” 

  


The call seemed to wrap up pretty quickly after that, possibly because Marci Brewer knew her son as well as David did, and when _that_ tone entered his voice, you weren’t going to have much luck with him for a while. It was, therefore, somewhat predictable that when Patrick set down his phone, it was with something of a snap. 

  


“She sends her love,” he announced from the kitchen, where he was seizing the dishes rather indelicately from the drying rack and putting them away—before they were dry, David wanted to protest; Patrick had instructed him, early in their relationship, on the correct way to live without a dishwasher, and it involved not stacking wet dishes under each other if you didn’t want damp pools to grow into mold or dry into unattractive watermarks on all of their—his—kitchen items. 

  


“That’s nice,” David replied. He waited. He could see it coming, the fight, and didn’t relish it at all. 

  


When there were no more dishes left, Patrick began to fill up his electric kettle. Got down a mug. Found a bag of the—oh, okay—he only took out the cool mint blend (a mix of menthol and spearmint that made his breath taste wintry-sharp and sweet all at once, like he’d eaten an after-dinner chocolate mint) when he was staving off a headache or was planning to stay up and work at something he didn’t enjoy. When he was actually upset. 

  


The steam was rising out of the kettle at an alarming rate, and still they were both just waiting in silence for the other one to say something. Or maybe Patrick wasn’t waiting. Maybe he was planning on going full silent treatment, going back to his match on TV and then straight to pyjamas, toothpaste, pillow, without another look or word to David. 

  


Eventually David couldn’t take it anymore. 

  


“So I take it we’re not feeling better about yesterday, then.” 

  


Like a cord snapping, Patrick wheeled around and glared at David, expression gone wide with astonishment. “Are you serious.” 

  


“I’m just saying,” David said, aiming for reasonable, “that I think you look— _fine_ , and we can send those photos out tomorrow if you want!” 

  


“We cannot send those photos and you know it. I look ridiculous.” 

  


“ _No!_ ” David knew his voice sounded insincere, because, well, okay, Patrick was right, obviously, but that was maybe not a great tack for right now. “You don’t. There was at least one that I think was… semi-usable! Plus Ray said he has photoshop so we can just, you know,” he gave it a little shoulder, “sort of, fix it up a little. There is not a single magazine spread in the last _half-century_ that wasn’t touched up, including ones—and I say this with all the love and awe due to our one true Goddess on earth—Beyoncé. _Beyoncé_ , Patrick.” 

  


“Is that supposed to be reassuring? Really?” 

  


His phone vibrated. He glanced at it reflexively—

  


MESSAGES now 

**Alexis Rose**

do you have a box

  


MESSAGES now 

**Alexis Rose**

actually nvm

  


Having not heard from or seen Alexis all day, and after Stevie’s weird questions earlier, David was briefly relieved to see texts (even two as strange yet boring as that) light up his screen. But apparently she was fine, and Patrick was still waiting for David to say something, so he refocused. 

  


“We can just—just have Ray re-shoot the photos, then! You’ll be back to being your normal shade of—” He pulled himself up short because Patrick was glaring, and okay fine, he didn’t need to be a brat about it, but come on. Love his fiancé though he definitely did, the boy was _white_ white. “Your normal shade, okay?” 

  


“We didn’t budget for two photoshoots, David,” Patrick shot back, hands firmly on his hips. “And we can’t just keep asking Ray for free do-overs because you don’t like the way we look.” 

  


“That is _not_ what I said!” David insisted, voice rising in pitch. “I love the way we look. I love the way you look, and obviously I spend a lot of time and careful combing through upscale online couture re-sell sites to make sure that I like the way _I_ look.” 

  


“Yes, and you always look amazing, David. Now is not the time to fish for compliments.” 

  


He flailed, surprisingly hurt. “Wow, that is extremely unfair. I want us to look good! Is that a crime?!” 

  


Patrick snorted, hands thrown up from his sides in frustration. “I don’t know, David. I want us to look like ourselves, not like some version of us that nobody would recognize because the people in our photos look like some strangers who just got airbrushed from a tabloid.” 

  


_We are not these people_ , chimed in his ear. 

  


“Fine!” he exclaimed. “Fine! Then we really can just use the photos Stevie took—”

  


Patrick groaned. “So we paid Ray for nothing?” 

  


“Oh my god, Patrick! I am trying to come up with a solution here and you’re mad about every single one!” 

  


“I’m not _mad_ , I’m —”

  


On the table, David’s phone started to buzz, buzz, buzz…

  


He reached down—Stevie’s drunk, winking face from the night of many Polar Bear shots shone out under “STEVIE YOUR BEST 😈 calling”—and silenced it. She could wait. 

  


Patrick was glowering. 

  


“What?” David demanded. 

  


“I don’t know, David. I just…” He scrubbed his hands over his face. “I just wanted some photos that made us _look_ like a couple.” 

  


David swallowed. He didn’t—that wasn’t what he had been expecting. Admittedly, David was usually not a fan of having his picture taken. Apart from some very heat-of-the-moment shots on Patrick’s phone (in a _locked_ , password-protected folder), and a few other snaps taken in the glow of affection and indulgence—at events at the store, at the motel with family, across the table at the café, once at a park in Elm Glen—, they didn’t have that many pictures of the two of them together. And he wasn’t honestly willing to share those few ones they had with anyone else, no matter how good he looked in them. They were… beautiful, precious, not for public consumption. But Patrick sounded like he was saying that _all_ of the pictures of them, even the silly, shockingly good ones from last night on Stevie’s screen-cracked phone, even the ones no one else saw, all of them somehow looked to Patrick like there was something was missing. Like they didn’t belong together. 

  


“I—”

  


His phone starting buzzing again. 

  


“Oh my god!” he cried, picking it up and swiping the slider. “ _What?!_ I’m in the middle —”

  


“She broke up with Ted,” Stevie cut in. 

  


“What?!” He plugged his other ear with a finger, like this was a concert and he had bad reception. Clearly he had heard wrong. “What are you talking about?” 

  


“They broke up,” Stevie repeated with emphasis. “I think that’s why Twyla was asking. Alexis and Ted had dinner at the café last night, and now they’re broken up.” 

  


He looked at Patrick, whose expression was changing, possibly to mirror David’s, although he had no idea what his face was doing. “Well, obviously that’s not for real. He wouldn’t, not after—and neither would she—that’s _clearly_ false. Twyla must have misunderstood, you know she —”

  


“David. She told me. With her actual words.” 

  


His stomach dropped, sliding with dread and confusion, out of place as he got to his feet. He couldn't stay still. “But that makes no sense! He… he flew all the way back here, and I am _positive_ that they—you know, did stuff, because Alexis told me not to come home yesterday during the day…”

  


“Unless that was them fighting? Or breaking up?” Stevie suggested. “I don’t know. She didn’t tell me anything more than that. She just came in and said she was looking for a box to put stuff in, and when I gave her one, she said she needed to pack up some stuff because they ended it.” 

  


“ _Fuck_.” David stared at Patrick, who was closer now and watching him carefully, with concern, which was good because David was going to have to put this fight on pause to go—for the millionth time in his life—chase after his little sister. “Fuck, _fuck_. Do you think he cheated on her?” 

  


That had slipped out—a thought he regretted instantly, sprung from his own paranoia and… just inability to comprehend how a guy he’d been thinking, over the last several months, as basically his brother-in-law was now suddenly… nobody. 

  


“Fucked if I know,” Stevie sighed. “But she didn’t seem mad. Just… quiet.” 

  


A shiver ran down David’s spine to join his wayward stomach. He’d learned at an early age, earlier than his parents or some of his therapists had wanted to believe, that a quiet Alexis was more worrying than a loud one. 

  


“Well, where did she go?” 

  


“I think she was going to Ted’s place. She just left. And she had a suitcase with her.” 

  


“Shit,” David muttered. “Okay, well, text me if she comes back?” 

  


“Yeah,” Stevie agreed, and unceremoniously but characteristically hung up without another word. 

  


“Alexis?” Patrick asked immediately. All the tension he’d been holding, the scowl and closed-off arms, was still lurking, but at least now it was directed sympathetically towards David rather than away from him. 

  


“Yeah, I don’t… Stevie thinks Alexis and Ted broke up?” David was looking around, searching for his keys, his coat, his—ah, his phone was already in his hand. 

  


“Damn,” Patrick breathed, low. “Is she all right?” 

  


“I don’t know,” David admitted, because that was the main thing. His keys? Where the fuck had he put his keys? His pockets were, he patted them down, nope, empty, great—

  


“In the bowl,” Patrick said. 

  


Sure enough, on the little, elegant ceramic bowl David had picked out from one of their local potters, both of their sets of keys—Patrick’s beneath David’s—were safely stowed. He didn’t remember putting them there. It had been a joking non-argument, once, that David always left his keys all over the place, driving Patrick crazy, and that the bowl was therefore a necessary rather than frivolous purchase. “So you don’t always have to look after me,” David had teased. “Occupational hazard,” Patrick countered, playing with David’s fingers. “Too late to stop now.” 

  


“David?” 

  


He turned, keys frozen in his hand. Patrick was looking at him gently, brows furrowed but… it didn’t feel like a fight, anymore. 

  


“Do you want me to come with you?” Patrick offered. 

  


For some reason, David shook his head. If she was planning on running, going after Ted or, or, who knew, running away to find _Mutt_ , or some other insane scheme, David knew he could talk her down best without an audience. He just had to find her. “But maybe have your phone on? Just in case?” 

  


Nodding, Patrick pulled his phone out of his back, large denim pocket, and flicked it. “Done.” 

  


David smiled, a little, and left. 

  


*

  


The town was small enough that, especially on a high summer night when the sunset bloomed late and the sidewalks were clear of snow and muddy slush, he could speed-walk to Ted’s in about fifteen minutes. He forced himself not to leap into full catastrophe mode. Fifteen minutes was plenty of time to go over everything he knew, twice, to speculate about how much money Alexis had and where her passport was and where she might go, if he didn’t find her at Ted’s. Given that both Rose parents were once again overseeing something at the new motel, Alexis couldn’t have taken the car, and even in her running shoes, she couldn’t get anywhere too fast while dragging a box and a suitcase (especially not her remarkably pristine Bric’s Bellagio case). 

  


David had only been here once, during that god-awful dinner that ended up like a bad idea Sudoku, one where everyone had to be sleeping with someone wrong. It was weird, now, to step up to the side door again after almost five years— _these_ five years—and feel like Alexis was maybe right back at the beginning, wanting someone who didn’t deserve her. Lately that possibility had seemed behind them, but… life had pulled the rug out from under the Roses before, why not do it again. 

  


He tried the handle: it was locked. But the light was on inside and (from what he could see, squinting up close through the glass) it did seem like—he took a deep breath—it was Alexis stomping around in there. He knocked. 

  


Her bouncy stride and flowing hair appeared in shadow through the (fugly lacy) curtain before the door swung open to reveal her, beaming a smile, “I’m sorry, Mrs. Mullens, I thought—Oh.” The smile fell off her face. “Ugh, David, I thought you were Mrs. Mullens.” 

  


Given that Ted’s mom was an astoundingly hot 50-something woman who apparently burned through Zumba instructors like other women her age burned through sickly-sweet vanilla candles, he took that as a compliment. 

  


“Um, hi.” 

  


Alexis rolled her eyes, and strode off back towards somewhere. David guessed that was as good of an invitation as he was getting, so he closed the door behind himself and followed. 

  


“So, uh, what’s going on here?” he asked, trailing Alexis to, evidently, the bedroom. He’d never seen this room, obviously, but was a little surprised to find such a relatively inoffensive painting over the very attractive, dark walnut headboard. But the two lamps were clashing distractingly, and then the duvet itself was a little off, too—at which point he remembered that Ted had once bought an entire house worth of furniture off a department store floor show, at which point David repressed a shudder and tuned it all out. 

  


The Bric’s case was open on the bed, and Alexis had apparently made the most of her time already, piling up things in a way that could only in the loosest sense be called _folded._ “I just came to get some things I left here, you know. As overflow from our closet, since you are always hogging it even though you also have space at Patrick’s.” 

  


“Firstly, I am not hogging it, we are sharing it equally, as indicated by the line down the middle we both agreed to two years ago. Secondly, you know very well that Patrick’s closet is an insult to closets everywhere and I am doing my best.” 

  


“Honestly, David, I’m not even listening to you right now. Can you hold this?” She held out a lovely multi-colour Rhode mini dress with tiered ruffles—one he hadn’t actually seen her wear in a while, come to think of it—which he took as she bent down to dig into the shoes at the bottom of the pile. 

  


“Isn’t Ted’s mom supposed to be here?” he asked, trying to tread lightly over the name in case it was now taboo. But that was the whole reason Alexis hadn’t squatted in this place to herself while Ted was gone. Right? At least he thought that was the deal, that Ted’s mom was selling her house, and had volunteered to look after Ted’s place (and, of course, the needs of her Zumba boyfriend) while her son was away. 

  


“Technically, yes,” Alexis conceded in a muffled voice, now squatted down and buried up to her armpits in the closet for god knew what reason. “But she left last night, to give us some space, and is staying with _Bill_ ” (even through six layers of clothing, her insinuating face was loud and clear), “until tomorrow.” 

  


“Oh,” David said, because… sure, but that was _obviously_ not what he was trying to get at here. He didn’t know how to reconcile Alexis still calling herself and Ted an “us” to the fact that David was now standing here, pointedly not-talking about the reason they were packing Alexis’s things in Ted’s empty house at 10:30pm on a Monday night. 

  


Alexis popped up, a flower crown in one hand and a crumpled, fuzzy winter scarf in the other. He watched her throw both into the suitcase, which was already bursting somehow with chunky knits and her winter booties and, _ugh_ , this is why he could never watch her pack without risking an aneurysm. He pulled the flower crown out, at least, so it didn’t get totally ruined. 

  


“And…” He looked around, searching for some way to break through this weird conversational barrier, ribbons streaming as he moved his hands. “And so, why can’t all this stuff stay here? Then?” 

  


“Because,” said Alexis, with a deep, impatient sigh, as she climbed onto the bed and began cramming the suitcase closed, “Ted left this morning for the Galapagos.” 

  


He shrugged, more confused than ever. She continued to shove things in to the case. “Okay…? Your stuff will still be here when he gets back, right? So —”

  


“He’s not coming back.” She managed to get the suitcase shut, somehow, with a satisfying _zzzip!_ Then at last her eyes came up and she sat back, just staring at him, tucking back a strand of hair absent-mindedly. For a second, he had an image of her, twelve and just packed for her first modeling trip, sitting in the middle of her enormous King-size bed in the Hamptons, dressed in that season’s hideous best—a baby blue, backless halter and diamond-ish studded pink mini skirt, an outfit that would have (and did) infantilize Sarah Michelle Gellar and both Olsen twins, and which had made Alexis look so, so young. This bed was smaller, and she was bigger, but her expression—composed, a little defiant, and, beneath it all, unspeakably sad—took his breath away exactly as it had done then. 

  


It took a moment for him to find any voice at all. “What?” 

  


“Ted left today, because he got offered a job. His dream job. They want him to stay there and work on a three-year contract. So he’s going back. And I’m… staying here.” 

  


Her voice didn’t waver or halt, just proceeded methodically, practically, spelling out the facts: Ted was gone, and Alexis wasn’t going with him. 

  


“But you…” He cleared his throat, trying to sound a little less like _he_ was the one about to cry. “You were going to try long distance before? And you could definitely visit him if he’s going to be there for three _years_? We could figure out a way to…”

  


She was already shaking her head. A small, sad smile quirked up one side of her mouth. “They’re going to want him to stay after that. Or if they don’t, some other, like, zoo or wildlife island somewhere else is going to want him to come babysit their little dolphins or lizards or something. It’s his dream. And things here are just… taking off, for me, you know? It just keeps getting busier... and it was already so hard. Like, so hard…” She paused, looking down at her hands, and David felt every fibre of his being snap into protective mode, because he could hold it together if she did, but if _Alexis Rose cried_ , the world came to a standstill. 

  


Of course, she didn’t cry. She looked up after a minute, still composed, and he wished he knew how she did it. How, after letting herself love someone as much as she had loved Ted—and apparently still loved him… how could she love enough to give him away, to give him back to himself? 

  


“Come on,” she said, pulling the suitcase off the bed and heading for the kitchen. 

  


There was a flattened cardboard box lying on the dining room table. She flicked on the lamp beside the sofa—revealing a pooled blanket, and an empty cup of tea. 

  


“Can you, um,” she went over to the bookshelf across the far wall, flapping a hand toward the table, “can you just, like, make that box real quick? I think this is the last bunch of stuff.” She started pulling books and magazines down, some that appeared to be her old coursework textbooks from Elmdale College, some that looked more like the real business books Patrick ordered for himself. 

  


David turned to the box, to give himself time to think. It was, thankfully, the exact same kind they had at the store—the white outside, brown inside kind that looked like it didn’t hold much until you filled it with papers or, probably, books, and then immediately regretted ever giving up on arm day. (Patrick once had come into the stockroom, very early in their relationship—actually, now David thought about it, technically even before they got together, before the store opened—and found David trying to tape over all the gaps in one of these boxes that had _refused_ to assemble itself properly. “How’s, uh… how’s it going over there?” Patrick asked, practically radiating pleasure at walking in on such a spectacle. “This fucking _Satanic_ —” He yanked one of his hands away, only for the whole damn box to come with him, attached by a wayward bit of too-sticky, now fingerprint-smudged tape, folded painfully around David’s index finger, “for fuck’s sake!” Finally he managed to get himself free, but now some of the tape was dangling off, half-tangled on itself, taunting him. “How are you supposed to do this if the tape gets stuck to all the stupid fucking flaps?!” Of course, then Patrick had come over, picked up the next unassembled box in the stack with a little smug, “Well…” and proceeded to do a performance of the world’s most boring origami, culminating in— “You fucker,” David had exhaled, stunned and annoyed and not a little turned on, sticking out his hands and receiving a completely tape-less box. Patrick, who in retrospect was absolutely showing off because he _liked_ David and could tell, maybe only subconsciously, that this sort of competence really did it for _David_ , just smugged harder. “Want me to show you?” He had, and the resulting scene of hands and teaching had been so like a perfect rom-com set-up that David had gone home on a cloud. He had even agreed to fold more boxes in future, just to see Patrick’s knowing grin every time he did it.) 

  


So, David folded this box, remembering in time that usually the flaps had little numbers so that even if this one was, as it turned out, a different _brand_ of box (who the fuck thought _boxes_ had brands, Jesus Christ), you could still make it work. 

  


Alexis had managed to build a wobbly set of books stacked two across, though with the magazines and some papers (most of which looked like homework and other scribbled notes) all mixed in. David wanted to roll his eyes, except the entire time they’d been standing here, neither of them had said anything. No small talk, no usual Alexis chatter about _Crows_ publicity or celebrity gossip or… well, Ted. 

  


David peeked behind him, once more taking in the blanket and mug on the coffee table—wait, and another one on the side table. No one had seen Alexis all day, Alexis Rose, the pathological forgetter of cups everywhere she went. Ted had never struck David as a cup-leaver. 

  


“When did he leave?” David piped up, trying not to sound too loud in the muted atmosphere of the room. It must be past 11 by now…

  


“Early this morning,” she replied. “He had, like, five flights to get back through, and customs, and everything, so.” 

  


She started piling things into the box without seeming to see them, and as much as it felt like nails on a chalkboard to him, David didn’t slap her hands away to do it right himself. Instead, he tried to hold things to the side of the box so she could squeeze the most of the stacks in there, with as little fuss as possible. Nobody liked having to take their stuff back from somebody else’s place. And Alexis had… well, David couldn’t ask, but he was pretty sure Alexis had sat here all day, by herself, drinking tea. Maybe trying to zone out with some mindless TV. Getting ready to pack this box, knowing that once it was packed it would leave an entire empty shelf, one that would sit for the next _three years_ , gathering dust on Ted’s shelf. A hole that he would see, one day, if and when he eventually did return, and probably be able to figure out right away what had been there and what he’d lost. 

  


It wasn’t lost on David, either, that Alexis was packing up all the rough drafts of herself that had shaped her into this person. She could legitimately advertise herself as a businesswoman who got phone calls from morning chat shows in different time zones, magazines with international publications—and ones that weren’t merely interested in the scoop she could give them on a yacht party or a smuggling scandal, but in the work she had studied remarkably hard to do. He marvelled, sometimes, at how much a blend of both of their parents Alexis was: capable, confident, gorgeous, outgoing, ambitious. She was a handful—that had always been the main word the nannies used, at least out loud when they handed in their notices. The fact that she was rising up, again, climbing closer to the level they had dropped from when they fell into Schitt’s Creek, asses first… it was no surprise at all that Alexis was going to resurrect herself to greatness. Even when she’d been little, she’d been hard to see as anything less than the personification of a sun. 

  


“I have to, um…”

  


David looked up immediately at her. 

  


She was gazing around the apartment, eyes moving in a sweep across the room. “I should probably stay and, like… clean up a little before, I… go.” 

  


Before he could stop himself, he asked, “Did he… say anything else?” 

  


Alexis quirked her lips—she wasn’t some awful _Bachelor_ contestant or anything, so she never bit her lips, even for attention, but right now she looked like she was trying to keep her mouth small, under control, in a way David knew from his own face when his emotions were churning. “He said he was proud of me.” 

  


His eyes stung in spite of himself, but he couldn’t cry here. He had to keep it together, at least for a little while longer. “Well... he should be.” 

  


At that, Alexis actually looked at him, blinking softly in thanks. His voice was raspy with holding back the waterworks, but he ignored it, and so did she. 

  


After a moment, he cleared his throat. “Okay, well I guess I’ll… take this home?” he asked. He went to heave the box—and ugh, it was heavy as fuck. “Wow, so maybe I should get a head-start since this is… not going to move quickly.” 

  


“Okay, yep, yep. I’m just going to… finish up here, and then I’ll be back.” He must have made a face, because she rolled her eyes and practically stomped a foot. “I _am_ , all right. Mrs. Mullens might be back super early to like… _get in some Zumba time_.” 

  


“Nope,” David shook his head several times, a little more under control now. 

  


“And no matter how much I applaud her cougar ferocity, I am zero percent interested in being around for _that_.” 

  


“Nope, nope,” he agreed. “Besides, a Zumba instructor called ‘Bill’?” 

  


“I know,” whispered Alexis, wincing dramatically. 

  


With a little inward whimper for how tired his arms were going to be by the end of this brotherly adventure, he huffed, hauled, and, with several small stops and adjustments as he tried to avoid cutting off the circulation to everything below his elbows, made it to the door. 

  


“Oh my god, David, it’s like, fifteen pounds!” 

  


“Ugh!” David shot back over his shoulder. “You’re the one who loaded it with a bunch of book-bricks!” 

  


She groaned, flouncing past, grabbing the two used mugs as she went. 

  


He was managing to get the door open while balancing this evil, slippery box on one leg, when Alexis appeared again. “Also could you maybe… not tell Mom and Dad about this? Not yet. I just… I want to tell them myself. You can’t tell them anything important once Mom’s in a post-make-up phase of the evening.” 

  


“Please,” he scoffed, “I don’t think either of us wants to rehearse every one of her relationship escapades at this hour.” 

  


Alexis gave him an appreciative nod, and disappeared back into the kitchen. 

  


By the time he heaved the stupid, devious box home, it felt closer to midnight than 11. He stowed it carefully under Alexis’s “home office” desk, his arms sagging with fatigue. As he caught his breath, he eyed it, unassuming there. His parents definitely wouldn’t notice it. They probably also wouldn’t notice, in the morning, one more of Alexis’s white-and-tan suitcases stashed in the corner. But they had been better at noticing _her_ lately—and at giving her credit for all the things she was accomplishing. Alexis always seemed like a scratch-proof Jaguar, a lean, mean machine that couldn’t help but glitter and impress. Ted had been good at making sure Alexis actually got seen as a person, as a woman instead of a machine, one who—despite zero appearance of sentimentality or pining—would maybe sit all day in her ex-boyfriend’s apartment just to say goodbye to the place where she had gone from being a trouble-making, selfish party girl to someone they were all proud of. 

  


They were a lot, as a family. But they were bouncing back, now, after five years of rebuilding and growing and learning to be better versions of themselves. 

  


( _What if they didn’t fit in Schitt’s Creek any more than Ted did?_ ) 

  


He could hear his parents through the open door, discussing something about stay-cations and Orcas and honestly who the hell knew. 

  


“I’m going to Patrick’s tonight,” he informed them, dipping his head in. They were both sitting up in bed, books propped on their laps but really just chatting. It was a familiar sight, one he sometimes glimpsed as he finished his nightly skincare routine and walked past the open door to his own bed, right before everyone gave up trying to stay awake and let themselves turn in. 

  


“Oh, all right, sweetheart,” Dad said, pulling off his glasses and glancing up. “Is Alexis with you? It’s pretty late.” 

  


“No, but she —”

  


Just then the door to his room opened, revealing Alexis, suitcase in tow. David couldn’t help but unclench around a tiny, shaky sigh of relief. 

  


“Here she is, fresh from a run,” he ad-libbed, managing to pull the adjoining door a little closed around him so Alexis could slip by, visibly _not_ in her exercise kit. 

  


“Just showering!” she called loudly. She kicked her suitcase onto its side, almost invisible next to their wardrobe. 

  


“Goodnight, then, honey!” Dad shouted back. 

  


“Breakfast in the morning, Alexis! We need to discuss _Crows_ interviews!” their mother added, at a slightly less neighbourly volume. 

  


David pulled his head back into their room, seeing Alexis’s expression shift back to opaque, cool marble. 

  


“Yep!” she called, gathering her pyjamas and headed for the shower. “Night!” With a last glance at David, though, for a split second, her composure slipped. 

  


Years ago, she had given him a look like that. Not quite meeting his eyes, not quite looking down, but with her eyebrows and mouth gone totally flat. At first, neither of them had really known what to do, but by the time he got his arms around her and hers around him, he could feel that she was trembling, slightly, holding it together by a steel thread of self-resolve. He’d wrapped himself even tighter around her and felt, to his utter amazement, her grab hold right back. 

  


He wanted to hug her now, to hold her tight like that again, to give her something to hold onto. Who was she supposed to hug now, if not him? But she was standing in the doorway of the bathroom, and she hadn’t asked—unlike last time—for anything. Maybe she didn’t want a hug yet, and David Rose was certainly a person who understood that. He _hated_ to be touched when he didn’t want to be touched—felt like he could either scream or explode, if anyone so much as grazed him, like almost every Sandy Bullock character at some point in each movie. That scene always involved shouting, tears, when the feeling got too much and she couldn’t cope anymore, lashing out when she got too sensitive even to allow herself to be touched, and yet it always got worse when she refused. _Hurt people hurt people_ , some tepid counselor kid had once simpered at him during a group therapy session (the first and last of his life). But he knew he was one of those hurt people, and he didn’t want to be. He tried to say without saying that she could ask for anything right now, and he would make it happen. 

  


She sighed again, nodded once, but disappeared behind the door. 

  


Half of him thought maybe he should stay—should be here in case she decided she wanted to talk. But the bathroom door stayed closed, and eventually even he could get the message. At least he made sure to shut the connecting door to their parents’ room before he left. 

  


*

  


Every part of him felt tired by the time he was able to get back to Patrick’s. His keys in the door felt heavy, but he tried to be as quiet as he could in case Patrick was asleep. 

  


When he got in, the room was dimmed but not totally dark—and Patrick was sitting up, in his (most beautiful, mid-century modern) chair under the brass spotlight, a book perched on his knee. He, unlike the Roses, looked like he’d actually been reading. 

  


“Hi,” he said softly, getting up. 

  


David nodded, because he wanted to reply, but suddenly his throat was tight. It wasn’t fair that Alexis had no one to hug while David had Patrick, even when they were technically in the pause of a fight. David knew how to be needy, basically had a Master’s degree in it, but Alexis had trained herself not to be, ever, especially here, and so how was she —

  


“Hey,” Patrick murmured, coming up close, and David launched his arms around him and dug his face into his neck, already crying. “Shh, it’s okay. It’s okay.” 

  


“They broke up,” David told him into his shirt. “She said it was just too hard, and she—she won’t cry about it, maybe ever, but she sat at his apartment _alone_ all day, and I didn’t hug her.” 

  


Patrick planted a kiss to the side of his neck, to the spot behind his ear, then pulled back to nose along David’s cheek where it was wet. “You were with her now, right?” 

  


“Yes, but we didn’t… We packed up her stuff. A break-up box.” 

  


“David, if that’s what she needed, you helped,” Patrick reminded him. His hands splayed wide and soothing across David’s back. "And she’ll still be here tomorrow. She can cash in her hug then, when she’s ready.” 

  


David nodded, because he wanted to believe that that would be enough. He was gripping the back of Patrick’s shirt so tightly, he knew, too tightly, pressed against him everywhere he could reach. What if her break-up was a sign? Alexis was a lot stronger than he was, as he had always known. He tried to get the words together. 

  


“I want you to…” He swallowed, lips catching on Patrick’s scent-familiar skin. A faint trace of cool, fresh mint clung to his mouth. David picked his head up, feeling ugly tears spilling down his cheeks. He was jinxing it, jinxing them; this was _Practical Magic_ and he was too happy; it was a horror movie and he was summoning the evil thing from the basement by saying its name. “If you ever get a dream job and it means you need to leave, you are going to have to be _extremely_ clear, because you deserve to go, if you want, but I am way too selfish to… to…”

  


“Stop,” Patrick interrupted, and David tried not to gag on the words he hated in his own mouth, bile-drenched and terrifying. “ _Stop_. I have my dream job, and I’m not going anywhere. And if _you_ get _your_ dream job somewhere, I’m coming with you. I don’t care if I’m invited or not.” 

  


It was a joke. Patrick said it like it was a joke, and David tried to laugh. But there was a flash of seriousness behind it, and David felt a rush of fear that maybe this was the real problem, that once again Patrick thought David belonged somewhere else. With a bolt of clarity, he realized he _knew_ he didn’t. He belonged here, with this man holding him as tight as he could, promising to keep him and stick to him, even when he thought _he_ was being the needy one by wanting to go wherever David went, and suddenly David couldn’t breathe. 

  


“Please,” he begged, and he kissed Patrick hard, fingers going up to thread into the nape of his hair, kissing him again and again and again when Patrick met him every time with equal fervour. And their legs were moving, Patrick pulling them backwards towards the bed, his hands burrowing under David’s sweater to plant his palms along David’s back, firm and sure. “I don’t want you to give me up,” he choked, ashamed of himself, trying to meld his body into Patrick’s so they wouldn’t even have to think about what he was saying or thinking, just stumbling towards the bed and into another kiss and then another…

  


Patrick managed to get the top half of David’s outfit off before getting David under him. Shivering slightly, while Patrick knelt over David’s thighs, David withdrew his hands long enough to pull his wool cuffed trousers down and place them semi-gently over the foot-rail, while Patrick got his own shirt then jeans off. Every button revealed tanner-than-usual skin, god. How good Patrick looked, all bronzed and taut, except his little hips beneath his briefs, _going, gone,_ because he’d evidently opted not to spray everywhere, leaving the lovely curve of his backside pale as the moon. In a split-second David felt a tease leap to his tongue, but in another he imagined himself saying it, pictured Patrick’s face ripple with irritation and hurt like it had all day in the store— _too much, David, this is why you’re too much_ —

  


“I’m sorry,” David mumbled, feeling tears slide down his face again, skin probably irreversibly puffy and horrible by now. “I’m sorry I made you into a Cheeto,” he added, thickly, “I’m sorry I got carried away. I think you’re beautiful.” 

  


“I know, David,” Patrick said, leaning down to cover David’s body completely, kissing him again, which was the best way anyone knew to stop David Rose talking. 

  


David tried to stop thinking, let his hands wander and pinch and scratch and pull while his mouth did whatever it could to stay attached to some part of Patrick without releasing him any more than was necessary. And Patrick gave him everything back, licked and bit and pushed until David was shaking, whining, muttering through broken breaths, “You’re the most beautiful person I know, I don’t even know how you’re real—”

  


“David,” Patrick gasped, almost hissed, finally getting a slick hand around both of them and putting his back into it, making David cry out, _finally_ , finally, he needed him and he needed this and he trusted Patrick to get them there, Patrick who was so good, who belonged to him, who he belonged to—

  


David got there first, arched and came into Patrick’s fist, his entire body sparking into a cry, a freefall, but one tethered to Patrick the whole time. He needed Patrick to keep touching him, even after his skin was oversensitive and tired. “Come on, Patrick, please, I need you to,” he urged, sliding one clumsy hand up Patrick’s spine to feel him quiver, the other down to grab his ass to force him closer, harder. “You’re so gorgeous like this, baby, I wish you had any idea…”

  


“ _Ah_ ,” Patrick groaned, and David murmured every good, hot, sex-drunk thing he could think of, rubbed him along the knots of his spine until he felt him let go, wet and hot onto David’s stomach. Until Patrick let his head fall so he could rest against David’s collarbone, whole body still panting, electric. “ _David_.” 

  


“I love you so much,” David whispered. He wasn’t even sure Patrick was listening this soon after climaxing, his ears possibly still ringing as he came down. For that matter, David was still feeling shaky, like he had plenty more cry in him even after such a crashing orgasm, and it was a 50/50 chance now whether he would burst into tears or fall into a fitful sleep. Mostly, he felt aware that, even if they went to bed upset tonight, at least they would probably be touching. All of Patrick’s skin seemed addictive right now, almost magical, like it should be painted by someone on acid who saw goodness and subtle, slow beauty in dashing bursts of hummingbird teal, jade, silver, and magenta. Or maybe something cuddlier, like all the million shades of an award-winning golden retriever’s coat, everything from silky caramel to light sandy beige to true gold. 

  


When Patrick finally rose up onto his hands and knees to unstick them, David felt too zoned out to do more than blink at him. 

  


“I’ll go first,” Patrick reassured him, a smile flickering across his face in amusement. “Don’t fall asleep.” 

  


He headed to do his bit of clean-up, naked and lovely in a sex-creased way, and as much as David fantasized about their having a bigger place all to themselves one day, there was something undeniably sexy in being able to arrange from memory the picture of every inch of this apartment as somewhere Patrick had been naked and filthy at least once. 

  


A bigger place… a house, as in an actual house, one that would defy statistics about millennials owning their own homes, because Patrick would budget them within an inch of their lives, and David would spend the rest of time trying to make it as beautiful as they both deserved. He’d be Donna Reed to Patrick’s Jimmy Stewart, except without the million kids driving them into debt and without the wicked landlord and hopefully without the whole “angel saves you from throwing yourself in a river” ordeal. David already had lived his other life. He knew the version where he didn’t have Patrick, or his parents, or Stevie, or Alexis, not really. It had been a million things, including sometimes indescribably exciting, but he didn’t want it back. Not anymore. 

  


Patrick came back and David swapped him for his turn, getting himself back to some semblance of a person it wouldn’t be gross to wake up next to, puffy eyes and all. David slid a sleep tee and joggers around himself before getting back into bed. 

  


“Hi,” Patrick said again, sounding nearly as wrung out as David felt. But neither of them seemed quite ready for sleep, just looking at each other in a way David had always thought would be either shamming or impossible. 

  


The quiet gave him the courage to say once more, “I really am sorry about yesterday.” 

  


A patient exhale out his nose was all Patrick offered at first. “I know. I’m sorry, too.” 

  


He studied David, eyes roaming while he seemed to be trying to figure out what else he wanted to say. David tried to be patient, to hold back the avalanche of things he was still working on boxing back up since this whole fiasco had started. But he didn’t remove his fingers from where they were lightly framing Patrick’s jaw, nor did Patrick’s hands go anywhere from where they’d settled on David’s lower back. 

  


“I… I think I should explain, maybe, why I was upset?” Patrick suggested. 

  


Of course, David had figured it out by now, but he pulled his lips under his teeth and nodded with an “Mm-hm” that he hoped sufficed. 

  


“Planning for this wedding has been…” Patrick trailed off, looking down at David’s wrists beneath his chin, and huffed a frustrated sigh. “We could get married tomorrow, in the town hall, with Roland as our officiate and Bob as our witness and I would be so, so happy. That would be beautiful, to me, because every time I think about being married to you, I feel like I’m going to… I don’t even know. Something embarrassing and weird, like have my head detach from my body and float away.” 

  


His eyes peaked up from beneath his lashes to catch David’s squirm at this gross, surprising, fascinating mental image—because wow, maybe all those lectures on conceptual art courtesy of Instagram and contemporary magical realism/science fiction were paying off! 

  


“But I want you to feel special,” he went on. “You have this, this vision of what our wedding would be like if we had a hundred thousand dollars, hell a million dollars, and instead you’re here, where we can’t even afford the nice venue you wanted unless we want a soundtrack of dying farm animals.” 

  


“Don’t remind me,” David grimaced. But he was starting to sense that he was wrong—that it wasn’t David who didn’t belong, in Patrick’s mind, but _Patrick_ , that they were both fumbling through this phase of their relationship worried it would end up like—he hated himself for thinking it—Alexis and Ted. But they weren’t Alexis and Ted, they were _them_. 

  


“And these pictures, they just made me think about how my family, all the people from my old life, they’re going to get these photos and wonder how the hell I got someone as beautiful and talented and as _much_ as you to settle for me, and —”

  


“Then they’re all very stupid,” David interrupted, his voice painfully soft, because he needed to make this absolutely clear. “I didn’t think… I am a lot, I know that, and—wait, just listen, please?” He put a finger over Patrick’s mouth to shush him, which earned him an impatient but indulgent smirk. “I get that you’re—that this is scary, for you, because I have been fairly vocal about the parts of this wedding that I want, and the parts that I wish we could have. And you are correct that my mood board scheme for our dream wedding would absolutely run well into six figures. But I’m realizing that I haven’t been as vocal about the parts that are… scary, for me. The part where I want your family to like me—not just _like me_ , you know I always want everyone to like me—”

  


“Even the tasteless people,” Patrick recited. 

  


“Even them,” David agreed, mock-frowning, even though that was definitely true. “But with your family, your old friends, I want them to see you how I see you—devastatingly handsome and dapper in your exquisitely tailored suit, and categorically the sane one in this relationship. Your people are going to fill up a whole side of the aisle and they’re going to look at my admittedly glamorous, probably _late_ family, all four of them, and then the rows and rows of empty chairs all behind them and be asking you why on earth you are—are volunteering yourself as tribute to a troupe of insane aliens in couture. And Stevie.” 

  


“David, do you know who’s going to be standing on your side when we get married?” His tone suggested the answer should be blindingly obvious, but… David searched his mind. Had Alexis pulled some strings and actually managed to get Gaga over their falling out?! “This entire town is going to show up for you. There is not a single person who knows your family, who knows our store, who knows _you_ , who isn’t going to want to be there for you on our wedding day.” 

  


The last days of summer unfolding across the field behind the motel, wild. Two aisles of white chairs—filled, he could imagine now, with Ronnie in that sparkly number that she’d slayed in for the _Crows_ premiere; Twyla, leading the other girls from _Cabaret_ ; Ray, talking everyone’s ear off about how he had fostered the “honeymoon period” of David and Patrick’s relationship; George, finally out from behind the small Café Tropical diner window; the two hot queer dads, Brian and Deepak, whose youngest daughter always came in and almost-broke something; the baseball club; their nicer vendors, including Mande and Sam whose wine was already going to be served through the reception… Both of their parents. Stevie, in a tux. Alexis, giving him away. 

  


“Okay,” David murmured, closing his eyes against the golden gleaming wave of it. “Okay.” 

  


Tugging slightly, Patrick reeled him closer until David could nudge his way under Patrick’s chin, get his arms around him, and steady his breathing against the terrible jersey cotton over Patrick’s sternum. 

  


When Patrick next spoke, his voice rumbled in his chest against David’s forehead and nose. “A marathon, not a sprint.” 

  


“Please don’t ruin the moment with sports metaphors,” David grumbled. 

  


Patrick laughed, then kissed the top of David’s head. After a minute or two, he pulled back to stretch out an arm and switch the bedside light. Then he snuggled back in, lifting an arm and letting David find his spot on Patrick’s chest. 

  


The slow, steady rhythm of Patrick’s breathing should have been sending him to sleep. It was dark, it was late, his body was already complaining about how it would feel tomorrow… but his head couldn’t shut off. 

  


“Tell me,” Patrick slurred, voice just this side of awake. 

  


It was a thing he’d avoided discussing with anyone, had barely let himself think about. 

  


“What if Alexis leaves?” 

  


The question hung there, and it did seem a little like hearing the words outside of himself had tipped the scales. It wasn’t really an “if.” 

  


“We’ll take her to the airport, and we’ll call her at annoying times of day just to bug her. We’ll visit. And she’ll come back.” 

  


It sounded… well, awful. Part of him wanted to sob and argue and beg Patrick to make it stop. But it felt like a collision course, a near-certain thing that he couldn’t prevent, couldn’t stop even if he wanted to. And however selfish he might be, he knew he wouldn’t stop this one. 

  


So instead he closed his eyes, forced himself to put that thought to one side, for a little while longer. It was still summer. 

  


**

**Author's Note:**

> Our lovely Alexis, the brave little toaster. Some speculation here on my part about what's coming because... phew, guys, it's gonna be rough. But Dan Levy continues to make brave, generous, tough story-telling choices, and that's more than we deserve.


End file.
